Spec Script Sale: “Lockdown At Franklin High”

Sony with a preemptive acquisition of horror-thriller spec script “Lockdown At Franklin High” from writers Greg Bishop and Joe Ballarini. From Deadline:

Pic is about a straight edge teen girl and her rebellious, socially outcast brother as they try to escape from their prison-like high school which has been locked down and plunged into anarchy and pandemonium due to the attacks of a ravenous, supernatural monster.

Clearly Hollywood perceives there is a dark mood in the world of moviegoers because it’s just one edgy script after another this year, each seemingly more gruesome than the one that sold before. In fact 9 out of the last 13 spec scripts sold have been in the thriller or horror genre. In fact the Deadline article suggests as much about “Lockdown”:

The inspiration is real high school lockdowns and tragedies and the intention is to use that for a dark and visceral roller coaster of intense fear and emotion.

Writers are repped by Paradigm and Apostle [Ballarini] and Andy Cohen [Bishop].

By my count, this is 20th spec script sale of 2012.

Last year at this time, there had been 17 spec sales.

Spec script sales are up 18% year-to-date compared to 2011.